


Waiting Up

by teagarden15



Category: A3! (Video Game)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-08
Updated: 2020-11-08
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:47:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27453712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teagarden15/pseuds/teagarden15
Summary: Banri comes home from a group date feeling pissed off and is surprised to find Izumi waiting up for him.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 59





	Waiting Up

**Author's Note:**

> It's been too long since I've written anything new for A3!

Banri stalked through the dark streets toward the Mankai Theater. He hoped no police drove by. They’d probably arrest him based on the scowl on his face alone, sure that he was up to no good. 

He’d let his college friends talk him into going to a mixer. He hadn’t been that interested in going, but they wouldn’t stop hassling him to go since he’d never been to one since starting college, and Kazunari always seemed to have a lot of fun at them. So, he’d decided to go. There was no harm in trying something new, right? 

Wrong. It had been a total waste of his evening. He should have stayed home and helped Itaru on his raid instead.

Once you hit college, you expect the girls to be more mature, but the girls at the mixer were either as giggling and annoying as he’d expect junior high girls to be, or hiding in a corner because their friends dragged them along or because they hoped some guy would come talk to them since they were too scared to talk to a guy themselves. 

Though while the loners coming to mixers and insisting on remaining loners annoyed him, they were at least better than the gigglers. He always got attention with his looks, and his personality drew all sorts of people to him when he felt like being personable. He’d had a whole crowd of gigglers around him the whole night, though he was pretty sure the girls making up the crowd had changed a couple times. It was hard to keep track when they all sounded alike. The same compliments, the same hair flipping, the same batting of their eyelashes, the same stupid, repetitive, inane giggle. 

Were there really guys who found that attractive? Who wanted girls whose main thought was how to best flirt and who couldn’t carry on a real conversation to save their lives? That experience alone was more than enough to ruin the evening, but then their vapid conversations about what styles were popular right now somehow turned to punk styles. There had been shrieks and eye rolls and talks of how they would never talk to a guy who was a punk, about how they’d cross the street to avoid them. About how lame multiple ear piercing were and how they didn’t make anyone look tough. 

He’d pulled his hair behind his ears at that comment and the girl who’d said it had flushed red, saying that obviously multiple piercings worked on Banri, but didn’t work on punks who thought they were cool, but only caused trouble. Some of the guys had joined in to, talking about how punks should stay off the streets and not bother normal people. 

Normal people. As though just because a guy got into a fight every now and then, it meant he was a bad person, it meant he wasn’t worthy of ‘normal people’s’ company. Screw them. If they’d never wanted to throw a punch at someone, it probably meant they lived perfect little, boring, orderly lives. Or that they were too cowardly to dish out a hit because they couldn’t take a hit. 

He wondered how they would treat him if they knew how many fights he’d been in, if they found out how big a punk he’d been in high school. Their attitude reminded him of the looks he used to get from adults just from being somewhere, like him standing outside a store was a crime just because of the number of piercings he had. Like he was trash because he didn’t take attitude from anyone. 

None of these people thought for one moment what it might be like to be in someone else’s shoes. Why someone might make decisions like that. No, they just liked to act high and mighty and pretend they were better than someone else. That was what it really came down to, them wanting to feel superior to others. 

There had only been one adult during his high school years who’d never looked at him like he was trash, who’d never acted like he was less because he sometimes got into fights. She’d taken the time to get to know him instead, believing more of him then he’d believed of himself. And it was that belief in him that had been a big factor in him changing himself around. 

His thoughts were so focused on Izumi when he walked into the dorms that it took him a moment to realize that she really was sitting at the kitchen table working on her laptop. For a moment he’d thought he was only imagining it, that an image of her had been conjured by his thoughts. 

“What are you still doin’ up?” he asked. “Isn’t it a little late for you?” 

She looked up, surprise on her face, then she smiled. “Banri. I wondered when you’d get home. How did it go?” 

She wondered when he’d get home? She wasn’t still up and working in the kitchen because she’d been waiting for him, was she? 

He shrugged. “I’m not sure what Kazunari keeps going on about. I wasn’t impressed. Maybe I’ll hold off on dating for a while.” Since apparently none of the girls at school were mature enough for his tastes. 

To his surprise, Izumi flashed a grin. “I want to say I’m sorry you didn’t have a good time, but, honestly, it’s a lot more convenient for me and the theater if you don’t date. That gives you more time to devote to practice and your work as troupe leader, so I’m selfishly happy.” 

He smiled back. “It’s not like you’re askin’ anything of me that you aren’t doing yourself. I don’t think you’ve gone on a single date since you started being Mankai’s director. Besides, I’m not going to be offended at you saying you want me to stick around more.” He didn’t want to read too much into her words, but it brought a warm feeling to his chest that she was happy about him deciding not to date for now. 

“What’re you working on?” he asked, tossing his head toward her computer. “You need any help?” 

She looked embarrassed as she closed her laptop. “Oh, no. I think I’m down for the night. I’ll turn in now.”

Banri smirked. “So, you were waiting up for me then?” 

An adorable flush filled her cheeks. “I just wanted to make sure you got home safe, that’s all. It can be dangerous to be out so late, even for a guy like you.”

“Says the woman who likes to make late night convenience store runs,” he criticized, then he smiled down at her. “How about I’ll try not to keep you up late worrying if you promise to grab me when you go on your late night runs?” 

She smiled back. “Deal.”


End file.
